


Investigations and Admissions

by ilyena_sylph, Merfilly



Series: Return of the Padawan [4]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Background Relationships, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Platonic Cuddling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-12
Updated: 2016-08-12
Packaged: 2018-08-08 06:56:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7747627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ilyena_sylph/pseuds/ilyena_sylph, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Anakin has to act first on his suspicions of the influence on the Vod'e, but the vod he chooses... means also dealing with Obi-Wan.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Investigations and Admissions

Commander Cody was used to having a Jedi invade his space before he'd fully become aware of them. He was not accustomed to it being General Skywalker, though, and for a long moment, he cursed Rex again in his head, in expressive Mando'a, for going off.

"General," he said, stopping himself from working on repacking his gear for the fifth time since he had awakened. If General Kenobi didn't take them back into the field soon, he was going to volunteer the unit to go join the 104th or the 327th. Having more than one full unit of field troopers on Coruscant was ridiculous, even with the abduction of the Chancellor. 

Where had _his_ unit been anyway?

"Sorry to bother you, Commander, but there's a situation I need to confirm or deny, one that has General Kenobi at risk," Anakin said smoothly. "Can you accompany me please? I'm worried about a … contagion."

"No bother, General," Cody replied instantly, shaking his head as concern for his General washed over him. Immediately followed by relief at that he had something to _do_ , which wasn't exactly the reaction he should have to something like that. "And of course, sir. What kind of a contagion?" 

"One that can cause erratic behavior? Like a high fever. The Healers should be able to isolate if you're carrying the cause," Anakin told him. He felt like the lie was pretty flimsy, but it was so close to the truth that Cody might play along without any cause of true suspicion. He did not want to hurt Cody, just to take care of him. Obi-Wan seemed to actually like Cody as a friend, and that was so rare.

"Haven't been anywhere the whole unit hasn't been, sir, are we all possibly exposed?" Cody asked, even as his hand flicked in a silent 'lead on'. If they were, he needed to tell the entire unit to lock down.... 

"I don't want to start a panic?" Anakin pointed out, rather brusquely, since that would be what Cody was used to. "You come, we investigate. If you're clear, great. If you're not? The Healers can hopefully make a fix for it that we bring back. But without causing any kind of noise." He pinned Cody with a serious look. "I can't let the Senate have any other reasons to doubt how good all of the _Vod'e_ are, by giving an epidemic scare, Commander."

"Of course not, sir!" Cody agreed, breathing a little easier. Jedi healers could do almost anything, after all. Some kriffing viral or bacterial agent should be nothing to one of them. And he hadn't felt off at all... 

Anakin breathed easier, and took the Commander with him.

++++

Vokara Che, apprised of the incoming case, was slightly irritable and promising to make Skywalker's life difficult if he was wrong. The clone brought to her looked to be exceptionally healthy, and cooperative, though, so she took advantage to get baseline bio-data for the Temple records. Genetic testing, blood samples, and bio-scans were all arranged, with a small, gentle suggestion that Cody rest while she worked.

She was glad of that, as the bio-scan turned up just the thing Anakin Skywalker had requested she search for.

"That's it, isn't it?" he asked, pointing at the small imprint on the cranial image.

"Yes. I'm going to fine tune and try to see what neural frequency it is tapped into, to determine if it can be safely removed," Vokara said, moving to get more testing in place.

"We can't operate on millions of men. Is there a techno virus that could be used against it, like the way we handled the evolved droids?" Anakin asked. "From what my man said, before he was killed, that thing is why Tiplar was shot and killed by a trooper named Tup," he told her. "I have to protect the men and the Order."

"Skywalker, I don't even know what it's _doing_ yet," she replied, her voice sharp, "or what protections might be built into the thing. And the Kaminoans aren't going to cooperate, not if what you told me about their response is true. You're going to have to let me work. 

"But that's not a bad thought. The Commander is fine for now, so please take your thundercloud of a presence away from my patients until I call for you again." 

"I'm a bit unhappy at the thought of leaving him alone, Master Che. He trusts me, and I didn't actually explain what I wanted honestly, because I was worried about those possible protections," he said. "If I promise to meditate and be quiet in my presence, may I stay?"

Sometimes sugar was worth using, and the Twi'lek healer was notoriously tetchy. But Anakin truly did not want Cody out of his sight right now.

She gave him a long, narrow look, then slowly nodded. "Yes, Knight Skywalker, you may. Your concern for them does you credit." 

"Thank you, Master." He inclined his head, then settled in the chair nearby, staying out of her way, drawing into himself. //Snips, it's in there. The chip. Master Che is investigating now.// He sent the information to her so that even if he fell down dead, someone knew.

//... _not_ okay. **So** not okay. ... Is Cody all right?// Ahsoka answered, silently pacing along the walls of the Senator's office, making sure that she was never entirely out of her sight. She was going to have Nala Se's _hide_ for this -- and she'd _liked_ her! 

//Master Che is _sneaky_ with her sleep command… he's out like a light. Obi-Wan can't even do that to him!// Anakin said with a little admiration for the healer. //We need a way to disable the chips en masse. I'll let you know if she finds anything. I'm wondering if a droid-popper could be adjusted to work on them.//

//... _sneaky_ , Skyguy,// Ahsoka sent, delighted with him at the thought. //I like it. Let's just hope it'll work. Padmé and I are fine -- well, except that I'm now seriously pissed off.// 

//You wouldn't be you, Snips, if you weren't. Seriously, I should have realized you were imprinting hard on them,// Anakin teased her lightly, grateful for that update on Padmé. //Going to meditate, try and sort out my head.//

//Of course you should have, I went straight from Clawmouse to an even _bigger_ clan!// Ahsoka agreed entirely, before she subsided some. //I'll be quiet, then, Skyguy. Talk to you soon.// 

Anakin settled then, reaching for a breathing technique that he had found useful in the past, to wait for Vokara Che's findings.

+++++

Where was Skywalker? Why couldn't he see him as easily as ever?

Palpatine did not like the direction this was going. The woman being in mortal peril was supposed to tip things fully into his favor with Skywalker. What new factor had been introduced that had blocked that and was now obscuring his chosen apprentice?

What would draw Skywalker back toward him? Attacking the Senator directly would not be crafty enough; she'd been placed in danger too many times in recent years for Skywalker not to be suspicious of a new attack.

Kenobi, on the other hand, lived in danger… and that was such a mire of emotions for Skywalker. Yes, he would craft a plan to drive a wedge between the two and eliminate the elder Jedi. Utapau. Utapau would do nicely for that. 

+++++

Anakin, sometimes, could make plans and stick to them. While Cody was recovering from surgery, and Vokara Che was studying test results, he contacted Obi-Wan, carefully keeping Ahsoka's bond shielding most of his mind as he touched his former teacher's.

//Join me in the healer's wing?//

//Anakin, what's wrong?//

That flare of protective worry pushed at Anakin's very belief in how things were between them, made him question just how Obi-Wan would handle everything if he knew. //I'm fine. Please come down; easier to talk than bond-speak with you.//

There was an accusation in those words, by accident, but Anakin had seen now that he could share everything down the bond to Ahsoka, and it flowed more freely than he let happen with Obi-Wan.

//Coming.//

It did not take long, and Obi-Wan arrived looking slightly rumpled, his hair sweat-streaked. "Sorry, I was in the salle, teaching." In truth, he hadn't been able to concentrate on paperwork, as badly as it needed doing, feeling like something was amiss. He'd hoped the familiarity of teaching initiates advanced lightsaber techniques would settle him, and then Anakin had called to him.

It was so rare to feel Anakin's touch that he'd chosen the eldest to continue their practice, and asked a young Knight to monitor them.

His head swiveled to the room they were sitting outside of, a familiarity there calling to him. "Who…" he asked, pressing outward to place that known Force signature, one that was faint, not a user but… "Cody?"

"He's all right," Anakin responded, instant, that worry in his brother's voice sliding along his mind, "but yes, he's why I called. 

"What happened to Master Tiplar... it wasn't an accident, and it wasn't a tumor, either. The same _kriffing_ thing was in Cody. Master Che removed it," he said hastily, lifting a hand to stop Obi-Wan from bolting inside, "she's studying it now to figure out how bad the situation is, and what we can do to fix it." Obi-Wan hadn't been with him for that, but Master Tiplar's murder had spread like wildfire through the Order. 

"And I -- I owe you an apology, Master. I... I think you were right, after all. About the Chancellor." 

Getting those words out felt like he was ripping chunks of his _skin_ off, but he had to say it.

Obi-Wan stilled completely and then shifted so his attention was fully on Anakin. "I'm sorry, Anakin." His mind was racing, with worry over his dear friend in Master Che's care, over what might be happening with the clones, and then Anakin said that? "What can I do to help?"

Anakin raked his hand through his hair, looking up at his brother with a shrug and a shake of his head, sure that too much of his heart was showing in his eyes. "Help me figure out how to protect as many of the _Vod'e_ as possible from whatever the kriff is lurking in them to kill us? Master Che will find a solution, but how do we get it to everyone before our attempts to take it out triggers it?"

His problems could _wait_ , when compared to the threat to their men. He had to protect them. 

"Of course," Obi-Wan said, that was a no-brainer. He would do anything for his troops, for the army at large. "But that doesn't help me help you, my friend. You look and feel frazzled beyond anything."

"...am I showing it that badly?" he asked, blinking once and lifting his head to meet his brother's eyes, half-surprised. "I -- need to talk to you, but it can't be here. Master Che has had words about my 'thundercloud' of a presence already. And we're not leaving until Cody's awake again." 

"As you wish, Anakin." He settled into himself, while directing healing energies toward the man that had been his right hand since the war began. Cody… to even think he might have lost Cody to something like brainwashing terrified him.

As he wished? Anakin barely managed to keep from snorting aloud. What he wished was never going to be something he could have, because that was the war over and his family together. The first half might happen. The last? Keeping his wife, child, and Ahsoka was going to mean losing Obi-Wan. He couldn't see any other result. 

//Anakin?// Obi-Wan had to reach out, because there was a shadow hanging over his friend he did not like. //We will actually talk today, yes?// He had to be sure, to get that promise. Anakin did not break promises.

He could feel Obi-Wan's concern, feel the uneasy worry... and that made it so much easier to say, //Yes. We'll talk, today. As soon as we've got a plan in motion to protect them.// 

++++

The best they were able to cobble together for a fast acting plan, one already relayed to Plo Koon and Aayla Secura, was to use a modified droid popper in combination with a fast acting sedative gas. Specifications for those, and a program to install in their surgi-droids were encrypted and sent, while Cody took his own copy.

The Clone Commander was going to take the entire 212th and move them out to all other units to assist in getting this fixed, as Obi-Wan had cut orders and explanations to take with him.

That taken care of, Obi-Wan focused on Anakin, to see if he was done with setting everything in motion to handle the 501st.

Anakin finished giving his unsettled Captain the orders he'd worked out with Master Che, thankful beyond the telling that he had pulled them to Coruscant with him since everything with -- with Dooku so that they were right here to be treated, and disconnected the comm, feeling Obi-Wan's eyes on him before he even turned. 

For a moment, he wished there was something else that needed to be done, just so he could avoid this a little longer.

"Well, it's in their hands now," Obi-Wan said softly. "Which leaves me with you, and willing to listen to anything you wish to share, my friend."

Anakin nodded, trying to get his thoughts and fears and fury under control. "Come on. I think one of the workrooms, for this. Force bless EM-shielding, I'm going to need it." Obi-Wan slid to his feet, and joined the younger man. He was curious just what all had gone through Anakin's head recently to lead to all this.

"Good enough?" he asked once shielding was on and the door locked in the room they'd come to.

"It's going to have to be," Anakin answered, moving to prowl through the room, his fingers raking through his hair as he tried to decide where to start. "I lied, in my report about the rescue," he started with that, quick and abrupt and clipped, and knew he was testing Obi-Wan. 

"Oh?" There was no judging in that, only honest invitation to expound on his words. "Tell me the truth of it?"

That wasn't the response he'd entirely expected... but it was the only one that could let him continue. He tested the Force, listening to it, and found no more censure there than he had heard in Obi-Wan's voice. He kept pacing, circling around the central workbench and his brother/teacher, thinking about how to explain. "...I was already getting angry, even before you went down. 

"After... we traded a few blows, and I'd gotten the high ground, but... he called me on how afraid I was, and it... it wrecked the clarity I'd gotten for a minute. We kept fighting, but for a minute I couldn't think. And then -- then the Chancellor called out. He said..." He had to concentrate to call up the words, then repeated them, as close to the intonations as he could get. " _Don't fear what you're feeling, Anakin, use it! Call upon your fury. Focus it, and he cannot stand against you. Rage is your weapon. Strike now! Strike! Kill him!_ and it... everything just... opened up inside of me."

Force, what?! Obi-Wan stared at him, then hastily spoke before Anakin could get the wrong idea. "What was the Chancellor thinking? You do not goad a Jedi past their calm!" He reached out to rest a hand on Anakin's arm. "I am sorry I wasn't stronger in the fight."

The horrified stare had almost shifted him back a step, but then Obi-Wan's hand was on his arm, he was speaking quick and intent... and the horror wasn't at him. It was at the Chancellor, just like Ahsoka's had been. 

He shook his head at the apology, his hand coming up to rest on Obi-Wan's to hold on. "Don't... neither one of us thought to take out the droids first. 

"That's not important. It... I've never felt so connected to the Force, Obi-Wan. It was incredible. I wasn't lost in anger anymore, I wasn't afraid to _be_ angry, or terrified for you and the Chancellor. It -- everything was just... so clear. Finer than crystal, and I knew... everything that was going to happen. I was faster, better than I've ever been. I wasn't lost anymore. 

"All I had to do was... choose. I could have drawn it out another hour and it wouldn't have made any difference to what happened. Everything he threw at me I had an answer for. Blade or table-fragment or foot, it took nothing to knock them away.

"And he knew it, too. I could see that in his eyes before I took his right hand off at the wrist." 

Obi-Wan could see it, taste it even, the feeling of having the fight at your own beck and call. Such clarity came with difficulty… either through embracing the Dark Side, or by desperation inside the Light.

"And it didn't stop there?" Obi-Wan asked, making himself be calm and listen. Anakin needed him to listen.

Anakin shook his head, feeling the tension in his shoulders only after he did. Obi-Wan wasn't challenging him or scolding, not raining censure or disappointment... only listening. "No," he said, aloud, "I pulled his lightsaber to me with the Force even as I took his other hand off.

"He fell, and I heard the Chancellor... laugh?" he nodded to himself, slightly, thinking. "I crossed the blades to keep him still, and it... 

"I'd won. I _had_ him, and that clarity... it faded, I started to feel like I was -- like I was lost in it again. The Chancellor told me again to kill him.. He was just this pathetic, broken-down relic, helpless. 

"That's _not our way_! But I wanted to, so much. And... he's the Chancellor. I had to save you both..." 

Obi-Wan moved then, shifting to where he was close enough to Anakin to be touched if that was what his friend needed, his eyes meeting Anakin's clearly.

"The Chancellor chose to ignore proper procedure, order an execution of an unarmed man, and you did," Obi-Wan said, not wanting to make Anakin have to say the words. He kept his voice level and controlled as he spoke. "After he'd goaded you to open to your emotions, almost as if… as if he knew what it might do?"

The Force was tingling in his skin, as if he were on the precipice of an important revelation.

Obi-Wan's first shift had had him tensing, waiting for the proverbial corrective slap... but Obi-Wan only shifted closer to him (close enough to lean into?) as he spoke. Said the words Anakin had been dreading saying in a calmer, more even tone than he possibly could have, and he felt himself nod helplessly. 

Then there were those last words, and Anakin blinked in shock. He hadn't considered that at all, even when Ahsoka was losing her mind with anger for his sake. 

It... it was true, though. He had spoken as though he knew exactly what the result would be. He nodded, even as his arm wrapped around Obi-Wan's back to latch on, remembering trying to surface out of what he'd done, what he'd been doing, and the Chancellor's soothing, gentle words as the guilt had started to choke him... and remembering another thing, too. "...he tried to make me leave you." 

Obi-Wan bit down on the 'you should have' that wanted to come out for that. The pair could have made better time without carrying his dead weight. Unfortunately, they were in close contact and Obi-Wan had opened the bond to be able to catch all the impressions, letting it flow outward by accident --

\-- and Anakin hissed at him, noise like an infuriated tusk cat more than human, sharply furious, as angry with him for agreeing as he had been with the Chancellor for suggesting it in the first place. "I will **never** just leave you. I **won't**." 

Obi-Wan shuddered at that avowal; he knew he should remind Anakin of attachments and dangers but… no. He was too tired of fighting that battle, well aware he'd be hypocritical if he did. Instead, he just shifted and wrapped his own arms around his friend, wanting to reassure him.

"I would have hated that I was endangering your life," he told Anakin. "But, more importantly, I am now fearful of the Chancellor, that he might be under the influence of the Sith, to have purposefully pushed you toward harmful actions."

He'd felt Obi-Wan shudder, had started to brace for the scolding lecture... and then his brother's arms wrapped around him tightly, holding on, and Anakin could really breathe again. He wrapped around Obi-Wan in return, clinging to him, jaw locking over his shoulder to pull him a little closer yet as Obi-Wan spoke. 

This time, instead of flashing into a rage at them, the words simply made sense, and he nodded against the shoulder he was draped over, holding him tighter. "I... I know. Like I said... I owe you an apology. You were right about that," he admitted, before just silently burrowing in tighter, clinging as tightly to him as he had to Ahsoka in last night's aftermath.

Obi-Wan caught a tiny part of that. "Ahsoka?" he questioned, surprised. He was not angry, though, as he kept hold of his former padawan, and that thought of the girl they had both taught. 

They needed to figure out how to handle the Chancellor, but he could not push Anakin. The younger man had looked to the politician as a friend for too long.

"She got Artoo to let her in... not last night, the night before," Anakin answered him after a few seconds to think and place things. "Said the Force told her that I needed her help, so here she was. 

"I didn't call for her... but I'm so, so glad she's here, it's..." 

"Helpful?" Obi-Wan provided, before half-smiling. "I'm relieved to know you haven't been coping completely on your own with the Jedi side of the issues it raised," he said, obliquely confirming that he knew Anakin had not been fully alone at all.

"If by 'helpful' you mean 'the only thing keeping me from going completely insane with worry', yes. You could say that," Anakin agreed, thinking, 'she did say I was nuts if I thought you didn't know' without saying it aloud. " And she's been... trying to work me through that, too. But mostly it's... I'm having visions again." 

"Oh no." Obi-Wan shifted a little so he could easily see Anakin's face but he kept his hands both on Anakin, offering the physical connection as a safeguard against emotional loss of control. "I failed to understand once before, Anakin. I promise you not to do the same now."

The flat-out admission of failure helped him stay steady... Obi-Wan's solid hold on him helped more. This wasn't the remote Master of the Order that had threatened him with expulsion from the Order... this was his friend, his brother, the best partner he could have, and not telling him was suddenly unthinkable. "They started the night we got back. It's... it's Padmé. Dying. Crying out in -- in labor-pain, and _dying_." 

Obi-Wan flinched, before his eyes got very big as he realized what Anakin had just told him, by saying the vision included labor-pains. "Where would she be without medical care?" he asked, rather than chase down the fact his padawan had decided to be a Sunrider.

"And now that's _three_ of you!" Anakin grumbled, rather than pay attention to the wide-eyed look. He'd actually _tell_ Obi-Wan later, if he had to. Right now... "I don't know how, I don't know where, but you _know_ my visions are always literal! I don't see metaphors, I see what's _kriffing going to happen_! 

"But the last one, the one last night.... Ahsoka felt something tainted touch me, just before it started. Touch _Padmé_ , too. She couldn't track it, neither could I... but someone's influencing me."

There was a sudden surge in the bond, one that was heat and protective fury before the calm descended again. "I see." Obi-Wan made a thoughtful noise, hand coming up to stroke his beard. "Would you trust me to be on hand when you both attempt sleep again? So I can attempt to follow the threads? If Ahsoka had been further along in her training, she might have been able to."

That flare of protective anger -- no, fury -- for his sake, for Padmé sake, made it easy to relax against Obi-Wan's arm still around him and the broad strength of his Master's chest, and he nodded once. "Yes," he agreed, even as some of the nervous energy he'd been using to keep himself going collapsed under Obi-Wan's acceptance. 

"Good." Obi-Wan offered a burst of Force energy, even if he didn't really have much to share, just wanting to cement the peace with Anakin as best he could.

"Stop that. You haven't got enough strength for yourself, let alone trying to bolster me." Anakin fussed at him, though he didn't push it away. "...at least I didn't bet Snips she was wrong; she'd crow for the next month." 

"She's likely to no matter that you did not bet, but what about precisely?" Obi-Wan asked his friend. "That I knew? I saw you and her after we fought Dooku the very first time. I had watched you be a nervous eopi over her before that. And you, my dear friend, are about as subtle as that Captain of yours ever is when he stages an advance."

"...but you never --" Anakin cut himself off at one raised eyebrow -- felt more than seen -- even as he wondered what Obi-Wan meant about Rex.

"Certainly I never did," Obi-Wan said calmly. "I had to make certain Mace nor Saesee or one of the others did something idiotic," he added. "Which led to me having dinner with nearly every single Master on Council at some point this last three years, to keep them from tracking you down for any number of reasons, I'll have you know." He mock-shuddered. "Some of them have very poor taste in food."

Anakin felt his head jerk back, his eyes widening as he stared at Obi-Wan in complete shock and bafflement. He had... what? But.. 

Obi-Wan had to smile at his friend for that. "She made you happy. As I'd failed so monumentally at that, I decided I would do what I could to protect her doing that."

Anakin shook his head slightly, watching Obi-Wan's wry expression, the ache he could see in his brother's eyes behind it, and he moved to lay his head back down on that broad shoulder. "I wouldn't say you failed at it, Master. We had a lot of good times..." 

Obi-Wan chuckled. "Yes, but in the end… we were not in a good place before the Arena, my dear friend. We've gotten some of it back, leaning on one another through the war, but I do regret much. Despite dwelling on the past being against the Code, blah blah blah…"

Anakin blinked at that sudden edged sarcasm from Obi-Wan, but it was... such a relief, too. Hearing _him _make that much of a criticism of the Council's decisions made his own doubts and angers seem more reasonable. "We have," he agreed. "But... no, we weren't.__

__"Not exactly helped by that I'm a complete ass when I'm not sleeping, Master and I really, _really_ hate not being listened to." _ _

__"I think I've learned the error of that," Obi-Wan said. "Even if you're still a little slow to listen to others with ideas," he added, eyes twinkling. He made certain Anakin could feel the light tease in the words._ _

__"...valid," Anakin had to admit, feeling Obi-Wan's gentle teasing. He took a breath, two, and stayed where he was, letting the comfort of this run through him. How long had it been since Obi-Wan had been willing to hold him?_ _

__Had that ever been a thing? When Anakin had still been a child, it had happened. And after, he knew he'd awakened in a bed several times when he knew he hadn't fallen asleep in one, so Obi-Wan had moved him around at least, made certain he was warm with plenty of blankets. But actual physical comfort as an adult seem to have become something Obi-Wan needed or used as direct consequence of the war._ _

__He wasn't moving away now, even if he was quiet now, letting Anakin be in his space peacefully. Force knew, he needed it. Even with Snips, he hadn't gone into as much detail as he did with Obi-Wan, and it... ached, deep in his chest, but Obi-Wan's solid, reassuring presence helped._ _


End file.
